Harry Potter casts a spell on accident prone children
BMJ 2005; 331 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.331.7531.1505 (Published 22 December 2005) Cite this as: BMJ 2005;331:1505All rapid responses
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It seems at touch ironic that Harry Potter confers musculoskeletal
protection for children at the same time as being an ambassador for one of
the world's highest-risk sporting pursuits: Quidditch!
In the final instalment of the series, he will have to beware of the
Master of the Dark (pharmaceutical) Arts who may wish to siphon off these
medicinal attributes.
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests
Many thanks for your interest in our article.
We read your hypothesis of the reduction in injuries we noted being
due to the fact parents were supervising their children all day.
Interstingly, the bookshops on these dates open very early and children
aim to buy their books as early as possible, often waiting from the early
hours of the morning. Thus the usual 'peak' of paediatric attendences in
the late afternoon would be less affected by this explanation.
Even if one were to accept this alternative causatitive hypothesis,
this would still relate to a reduction in accidents due to Harry Potter
books release; the key message of the paper. We suspect children are not
supervised reading on the sofa at all times.
The question of longevity of this effect is illustrated in the paper,
with the attendence rates for the week following the book releases being
illustrated on the graph. We chose not to sub-divide these dates further
as a) Children read at different rates, b) As 75% of all harry potter
books are sold on the first weekend we used it's release day as a point-
intervention.
Many thanks again for your interest and we would of course welcome
replication of our methodology to answer specific questions of causality
and longevity of effect.
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests
Children need constant supervision. Distractions and inadequate
supervision are often the cause of accidents [1]. The author had
overlooked this possibility. Perhaps it was a day-out when children were
out buying and browsing books, which were closely supervised by their
guardians, and hence the lesser incidence of accidents. Considering that
it would have ordinarily taken few days to read the book(s) completely, it
would have been interesting to note whether the relative incidence of
accidents continued to remain low over weekdays following those specific
weekends.
Reference:
[1] The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents
<http://www.rospa.com/homesafety/advice/child/accidents.htm>
Competing interests:
Author is a Harry Potter fan and did not sustain any accident during the said periods.
Competing interests: No competing interests
Harry Potter - Hidden Dangers
I read with great interest the findings of your study. However,
although it has demonstrated that the initial reading of the books reduces
the incidence of accidents, further research should address the potential
increase in head trauma, fractures and other musculoskeletal injuries
resulting from children throwing themselves at railway station walls in an
attempt to reach Platform 9¾.
Competing interests:
Author sustained slight bruising to toe after dropping 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' on foot.
Competing interests: No competing interests